Rules Of Attraction by Simone Elkeles Read Free Book Online Page B

inhale.
    “Nick wanted to meet you,” she tells me. I notice her eyes are
    bloodshot. I wonder how many hits she took before I got here.
    Lacey peeks her head in. “Madison, I need you!” she screeches.
    “Come here!”
    Madison tells us she’ll be right back and stumbles out of the room.
    Nick waves me to the couch beside him. “Take a seat.”
    The guy is too slick, and my radar goes up. I know his game,
    because I’ve seen a hundred Nicks in my lifetime. Hell, I was a ‘Nick’
    back in Mexico.
    “You dealin’ the stuff?” I ask.
    He chuckles. “If you’re buyin’ it, I’m dealin’ it.” He holds out the
    bong. “Want a hit?”
    I hold up the can of beer in my hand. “Later.”
    He narrows his eyes at me. “You’re not a narc, are you?”
    “Do I look like a narc?”
    He shrugs. “You never know. Narcs come in all different shapes and
    sizes these days.”
    I immediately think of Kiara. She’s definitely become my daily
    entertainment. I try and peg her reactions every time I do my best to
    piss her off. Her rose-colored lips tighten into a thin line every time I
    make an outrageous comment or flirt with a girl. No matter what I told
    her, and no matter how many cookie crumbs are scattered on the inside
    of my locker, I’m gonna miss havin’ her as my peer guide.
    I haven’t decided what I’m gonna do to get back at her for the
    cookie stunt. whatever it is, she’ll never see it comin’.
    “I hear Madison wants to get into your pants,” Nick says as he pulls
    out a bag of pills from his front pocket. He spills them out on the table.
    “Yeah?” I ask. “Where’d you hear that?”
    “From Madison. And you know what?”
    “What?”
    He pops a little blue pill into his mouth and throws back his head to
    swallow it. “Usually what Madison wants, Madison gets.”
    EIGHT : Kiara
    “I’m color-blind,” Mr. Whittaker complains in a cranky, scratchy
    voice as he dips a paintbrush into a cup of brown paint and swipes it on
    the canvas. “Is this green? How am I supposed to paint anything when
    these colors aren’t labeled?”
    There’s never a dull moment during art class at The Highlands
    Long-Term Health Care Facility, otherwise known as a nursing home.
    The regular art teacher quit, but since I was volunteering to help
    during art hour I just kind of took over the class. The administration
    supplies the paint, and I come up with subjects for those who want a
    painting activity after dinner on Friday nights.
    As I rush over to Mr. Whittaker, a little old lady with stark white
    hair named Sylvia comes shuffling over to us. “He’s not color-blind,”
    Sylvia croaks out as she finds an empty easel and sits down. “He’s just
    plain ol’ blind.”
    Mr. Whittaker looks up at me with his thin, weathered face as I
    kneel beside him and label the colors with a thick, black marker. “She’s
    just sore because I wouldn’t dance with her at the social last week,” he
    says.
    “I’m sore because you forgot to put your teeth in at dinner
    yesterday.” She waves her hand in the air. “He was all gums. Some
    Casanova you are,” she says in a huff.
    “Hussy,” Mr. Whittaker growls.
    “Next time maybe you should dance with her at the social,” I say.
    “Make her feel young again.”
    He reaches up with calloused, arthritic fingers and pulls me closer.
    “I’ve got two left feet. But don’t tell Sylvia that, because she’ll give me
    a hard time.”
    “Don’t they have dance lessons here?” I whisper right into his ear,
    loud enough so he can hear but the rest of the class can’t.
    “I can hardly walk. A Fred Astaire I’ll never be. Now, if you were
    the dance teacher instead of that old bat Frieda Fitzgibbons, I’d
    definitely start coming to lessons.” He waggles his overgrown white
    eyebrows at me and pats me on the butt.
    I shake my finger at him. “Didn’t anyone tell you that’s sexual
    harassment?” I tease.
    “I’m a dirty old man, honey. In my day there was no